Meet Eva
The nurse who saw a gap and built a solution to save lives
Eva Said
is a UK-trained nurse living in the Kurdistan region of Iraq.
What she has experienced there motivated her to establish a charity for healthcare training.
Nurses and midwives were on the front lines, but in many cases, their ability to provide care was constrained, both by limited access to training and by systems that did not fully utilize their role.
Even highly motivated providers were sometimes unable to act independently in critical moments.
Eva saw the gap clearly:
The people responsible for saving lives weren’t being given the tools to do it.
Starting Small
She began with a small classroom.
In 2016, Eva started training nurses herself, sharing what she knew, one group at a time, in borrowed spaces with limited resources.
She taught a few nurses at first.
More nurses came.
Then more.
And more.
It became clear: the need was far greater than one person, or one room, could meet.
A Bigger Vision
Space was only one limitation. The need for modern training equipment was evident as well.
Eva began to imagine something different.
A purpose-built facility where nurses and midwives could practice before treating real patients.
A place with modern equipment.
A place that could raise the standard of care across an entire region.
Turning Vision into Reality
That vision became possible through a pivotal partnership.
In 2022, with support from humanitarian representatives of
The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints,
and through the leadership and advocacy of former Relief Society General President,
Jean B. Bingham, funding was secured to build the Nursing and Midwifery Development Centre.
In 2024, The Nursing and Midwifery Development Centre was born!
Pictured from left to right: Eva Said, Barbara Blackford, Abby Melby, Jean Bingham, and Carolyn Melby in Erbil
Latter-day Saint Charities invested $1.9 million to make the vision real.
What started as a small classroom became a 36,000 square-foot training facility with:
11 high-fidelity simulation labs
Capacity to train up to 7,000 healthcare providers each year
A model designed to strengthen the entire healthcare system
It’s a place where:
Nurses gain life-saving clinical skills
Midwives learn to manage complications safely
Healthcare providers train in realistic, simulated environments before treating patients
And every training has a ripple effect, as one provider can reach thousands of patients over the course of a career.
The NMDC is More than a Building.
The Centre is built.
Now the work must be sustained.
Your Role in the Story
The Nursing and Midwifery Development Foundation exists to carry this work forward.
To ensure that the NMDC endures.
Funding annual courses and training programs costs $200,000 each year.
We seek to build a permanent endowment that will fund training for generations.
Your support helps build a permanent endowment to sustain this life-saving training for generations.
